The Storm: War's End, #1 Page 4

  Allen knew exactly where Jess was being kept, although before this he hadn’t been to her room. Her screams, coming from the opposite end of the tent the first time he had visited the tent had given him nightmares. The thought of her being used in such a way twisted his guts in knots and he had restrained himself with difficulty from running in, killing that monster Cooper and attempting some stupid and doomed escape. It had been a solid month before he could return and even then he wasn’t sure he could see her like that, so he stayed on the other side and did not attempt contact. Now that spring was coming, with the possible cover of thunderstorms, they could all escape. Footprints couldn’t be as easily tracked without snow and ice on the ground.

  Allen took a deep breath as he entered the tent, his guts twisting at the sounds that came from this awful, soul-killing place. It had been nearly four months since he had seen her. He steeled himself for it and pushed aside her room flap and walked in. She was lying there, not handcuffed, thank god; they only did that at night now. She wore a faded red Western Front uniform shirt and she had a thin blanket covering the rest of her. Someone had just finished with her. Allen’s bile rose in his throat as the soldier had swaggered past zipping up his pants. Allen ignored him and held himself back from doing great violence at that moment. It was all he could do not to turn around and grab the guy from behind in a sleeper hold. It would be righteous and satisfying to choke the life out of him.

  She didn’t recognize him until he had climbed on top of her and leaned in close. In that moment she stiffened. It had certainly happened before with some of the boys she had known in high school.

  They were conscripts, here under the same circumstances as Allen. But as the months stretched out and the distance between Belton and this place grew, they slowly changed. The tent had seen a slow uptick in visits from conscripts. They avoided each other’s gaze if they met in the corridors but shame didn’t stop them from coming back.

  Her body was warm and soft underneath him. She smelled, damn, she smelled like vanilla and musk. He whispered in her ear the plan and slipped her the handcuff key. He was embarrassed to realize he had a hard-on, although who would have blamed him? It was natural; she was beautiful and sweet, even now in this terrible place. She was everything he had ever wanted. Maybe after this was all over, when they escaped, with effort he banished the thought and hope of it from his mind. Back to business. It was time to act tough like he did with Chris in front of the others. He kissed her lightly on the cheek and took one great liberty – kissing her on the lips. Then he had slapped her thigh hard, talked shit, and got up and walked out of the room. It was the grand and dramatic exit, and it had its effect. Carmen, that monstrous and sexless creature, laughed and pointed him down the hall towards another open room.

  As he walked away, his hand strayed to his lips, still feeling the softness of hers against his and he realized that the only thing that had stopped him from grabbing her and running like hell for the door was the image of Chris trying to do it and how it would look when he failed. He had done what he could. Now Jess would have to get her and Erin out at the right time. Cross their fingers, cross the toes, and a truckload of luck, and they all might make it out of there alive.

  His pretty fantasy of them escaping hand in hand together was shot to hell when Chris refused to head west that fateful night. Instead he insisted on heading towards Tennessee. “The girls will need a head start, and plenty of time, I’m heading southeast, so hopefully the trackers will follow my trail. There are three others who know we are planning something and want in on it.”

  Allen did not like the sound of this. Together, they had a better chance of survival. But three new guys he hadn’t met and didn’t know if he even trusted?

  Alone, what would the girls do in the wilderness? How would they cover their tracks or survive? He asked all of these questions and more of Chris.

  “Erin knows plenty of survival skills. Her parents were some kind of survival nuts and Toby knew so much he could practically teach the rest of us how to live off the land and survive during any season. The family went camping all the time. Jess has the key. So she will get them out of there and Erin will keep them fed. Besides,” he said, sounding far more confident then he felt, “we just need to do big circles and then get everyone back to Belton. Not everything burned, not everyone is dead.”

  Allen just shook his head. This was not what they had planned. “I’ll head northwest, get back up to Highway 60; hopefully I’ll meet them along the way to Springfield. Don’t go far into Tennessee, double back, and we’ll all join up again.”

  It was wishful thinking, this plan of theirs. Its success was contingent on so many variables, and each of them had to go just right for success to occur. Despite the horrors of the past few months, Allen and Chris were still young and idealistic. They had no idea just how badly the plan would go wrong.

  In the violent storm that followed, the three other men were shot in the back before they ran past the outermost tent on the north. The girls made it out and took off west, straight into the storm. Allen watched as they disappeared into the trees. Their escape was successful, no one raised an alarm until one of the guards had gone looking for something sweet at three in the morning. When he realized Erin’s bed was empty of anything but a strategically placed pillow he had woken the entire camp. Chris had also run into the night without incident, heading southeast towards Tennessee. Allen had delayed leaving until he was sure no one was following the girls. He was caught the following day as he lay wrapped in a sodden blanket, having passed out under a fallen tree, exhausted from running.

  The memory of Jess’s body beneath his kept him focused when they interrogated him. He had said nothing when their fists smashed his nose and knocked out two of his teeth. But he had screamed, oh god how he had screamed, as Cooper’s knife cut deep into his ankles, ensuring he would never, ever manage to escape again. Or ever really walk. But Allen knew his time was up. They had thrown the dice and while some had won to play another day, he was a dead man. He said as little as possible, grinding his teeth as Cooper cut on him, and finally screaming when the pain got to be too much. He told them nothing, nothing more than they already knew. They knew that Jess, Erin, Allen and Chris had all come from the same small town. In his heart he nourished the hope that their escape was certain now. It had been three days and no word.

  Cooper leaned close, shoved the knife in all the way to the hilt and twisted it back and forth in the deserter’s gut. He smiled as Allen’s eyes glazed in agony. He figured he had about twenty minutes, maybe thirty, before the little crap died. He took his time, described how he had screwed the little whores, both of them, but especially the little blond one, every possible way, again and again. He promised the boy he would do it again, when he found them, over and over and over, until they were both dead. He was pissed off and frustrated. Kipling would have a cow when he found out that he had knifed this little weasel but at the moment he didn’t care.

  Allen knew he was dying. He felt removed from it all, as the pain seemed to fade away. He could smell her still. That sweet, fresh scent as he had laid against her in Tent 5 stayed with him. He cherished that memory, held it close and ignored the man standing over him.

  It pissed Cooper off that the kid took almost 40 minutes to die. He’d never seen anyone hang on that long. But what pissed him off the most is that when the damn fool finally did die, he was smiling.

  Forest Refuge

  “I don’t know what I thought. I guess it was that, somehow, Chris and Allen would magically appear. As we walked, hiked, and limped in the days that followed, I looked for them, sure they would be just around the next tree. Every creak from a tree, every rustle of leaves, I would jump and look. In my mind there were only two outcomes – it would be my brother and friend, or it would be soldiers from the camp. In some ways, that feeling followed me all the way home and stayed with me there for years. If I could only turn quickly enough, there they would be.” – Jess’s Jou
rnal

  A high-pitched whine in Jess’s ear woke her with a start. Her body ached, burned in places, and her feet were throbbing. Again she heard the whine at her ear. It was a mosquito, damned early in the season and hungry for what little blood it could find. Jess slapped at it and then stared at the masses of scratches on her arms and legs. What a night it had been – they had been too busy running for their lives to even feel their injuries until now. Erin’s eyes flickered open, pupils dilated in fear, her body tensed. She sat up, disoriented and looking around her wildly, “Wh—what? Where?”

  “It’s okay Erie, everything’s okay. It’s just a mosquito come to finish us off.” Jess joked to her friend and was delighted to see her manage a weak smile in return. It felt so damn good to have her best friend in the world back. She hadn’t had any bad dreams, and despite their bruises and scratches and swollen feet, she felt as if she and Erin were the two luckiest people in the world right now. And then her thoughts flashed to Allen and Chris. Had they gotten out? She imagined a reunion, and then all four of them setting off together and heading home to Belton. She scanned the trees and fear and bitterness resurged inside her – how could they possibly find each other when Jess had no idea where they were?

  It was at this point that her stomach rumbled painfully, making its presence, and its yawning emptiness known. Jess looked around, nothing but trees and more trees and the now quiet, gurgling stream at their feet. Her heart plummeted, what in the hell could you eat in a forest?

  The sun was slipping down, casting long shadows around them. They wouldn’t get far in the dark, not without moonlight, and Jess had timed her escape with just that, and a convenient thunderstorm, in mind. She turned back to Erin who was now crouched by the stream digging her long fingers into the mud near the base of a plant that was growing in the shallow waters. A bulrush-like appendage at the top of the stem waved in protest as Erin tugged at the entire plant, pulling it out roots and all. In a few months the spear that was just now beginning to emerge would turn to a dark brown. For now, it was a creamy color, barely yellow, new growth responding to the slowly warming temperatures.

  Jess just gaped at her friend and wondered if she had gone absolutely insane. “Uh, Erie? What are you...”

  Erin turned and shoved the entire plant into Jess’s arms. “Clean all the mud off, will you? Take special care getting it off the roots and the inside of the plant. I’ll be back.”

  And with no further explanation she walked off, headed away from the stream, towards a thick clump of trees. A few minutes later she was back, one pocket bulging, and her shirt held like an apron in front of her, various leaves and flowers sticking out.

  “I saw some ferns, but no fiddleheads; I can’t wait until we can pick them.” Erin looked over at Jess who was standing there, looking confused, the cattail dripping mud down her arms. “You haven’t washed that off yet, what are you waiting for? Aren’t you hungry?” she laughed at Jess’s confused expression, “You’re holding part of our dinner there, and I’m starving.” She gave her friend a small shove, “Rinse it off and I’ll explain.”

  If her friend was losing her mind she was acting particularly calm while doing it, so Jess complied, mystified at the thought of eating some mucky old weed. As she rubbed away mud and waited until the water ran clean, Erin reminisced about camping with her family over the years.

  “You remember how my dad was, always into the survival stuff.” She laughed as the tears sparkled in her eyes, “He used to put on some silly old movie, Red Dawn, and tell us to pay attention ‘cause that’s how the world would end.” She shook her head at the thought, “I just thought he was full of it.”

  She finished rinsing off the cattail and was silent for a moment, reliving their loss before she shook off the memory and brought her thoughts back to the present.

  “We can’t eat the fiddleheads till they emerge in about two weeks and that’s a damn shame. They’re the best. We usually pick ‘em, cook ‘em and smother ‘em in Cheez Whiz, dee-lish!” She rinsed the rest of the leaves and flowers free of any insects or clinging dirt.

  Jess wasn’t as sure about their dinner plans. “You sure this stuff won’t make us sick? I mean, if it were food, wouldn’t everyone eat it?” This earned a giggle from Erin who handed her a handful of something resembling giant clover leaves.

  “It’s wild, silly, not like a crop that there are tons and tons of. Eat this, its sorrel, high in Vitamin C.” She stifled another giggle as Jess put the leaves into her mouth and bit down and made a face.

  “It’s sour!”

  “Yeah, well, it’s good for you, so eat it.” Erin handed her some other leaves, “And I actually found a small patch of dandelion.”

  “I’m not eating some old weed!”

  Erin’s smile vanished, “If you want to survive you will. This is food, Jess, and it’s all we’ve got. I picked up some acorns, but we need to roast them, and I don’t think we should risk a fire yet. We need energy to keep moving and get out of this forest and as far away from those bastards as possible.” Her face took on a haunted look, “You got us out of that awful place, now I’ll keep us alive. Okay?”

  Jess nodded, her friend really seemed to know her stuff. Really, when she thought about it, she was too hungry to care what it was. “Okay, Erie” and stuffed the leaves in her mouth. They weren’t bad, they reminded her of the peppery taste of arugula. Her stomach seemed to growl a little less, so whether it was ‘food’ or not, at least one part of her didn’t seem to know the difference.

  Later, her hand fell to a lump in her pocket and she retrieved the three stale biscuits. They helped provide some substance to the greens they had eaten and she and Erin tore into them gratefully.

  As they ate, the sun dipped below the trees and darkness fell swiftly. The girls finished their sparse meal and took the last few threads of light to wash their arms, legs and feet in the clear, bracingly cold water.

  As the darkness enveloped them they curled into their nest, wrapped their arms around each other, and pulled the blanket close. Within moments they were both sound asleep.

  Soldier Running

  “Courage is not the absence of fear, but rather the judgment that something else is more important than fear.” – Ambrose Redmoon

  Chris had run through the night, through the onslaught of rain and lightning. He kept running, heading south. He figured he’d made it at least ten miles. He’d stuck to the roads and figured he could dive out of sight in time if he saw lights. The roads had all been empty. The signs for Route VV had given way to Highway U and Chris saw that he was still heading south when the sun began to clear the clouds in the east. It was cold out and his jacket was still damp, despite the rain having ended hours ago. His pants were damp too, but the rest of him was dry and warm from running. After months of being run from one place to the next, along with all of the latrine digging duty he’d been assigned, his body was in perfect condition. But even he had his limits. It was time to stop, rest, and eat some of the food he’d managed to squirrel away in the past few days.

  A stand of trees a few hundred yards from the road looked promising. Chris could see several evergreens. All of the deciduous trees were still bare, but he could create a nest at the base of the evergreens and be out of sight. He turned off the road, avoided patches of mud that would betray his presence, and climbed over a bent section of wire fencing. He could see a house in the far distance. It had smoke curling from the chimney, so it was occupied, but with only a Western Front uniform on him he figured his chances of getting shot were far more likely than an offer of food. Perhaps after he’d had some sleep and it was closer to dusk he would re-consider his options.

  He moved the lower branches of the largest evergreen, hacking at one or two in order to lay a bed of pine needles beneath him as cushion and for some relief from the cold, damp ground. The last few months had prepared him for making do with little. He remembered the first few weeks after the troops had stormed Belton. From the stress
and fear as they were herded south, to the hard cold ground he had shivered on each night, he had nearly been broken by sheer exhaustion. Eventually he had learned to sleep whenever he was given the chance, whatever the time of day, and in pretty much any conditions short of a firefight. He knew it would be ten minutes, tops, before he would be sound asleep. Around him birds were waking up and cheeping at each other. He pulled his pack closer to him, double-checked that his little nest was well hidden and closed his eyes.

  He wondered where Jess and Erin were. God, he hoped they had escaped. Were soldiers looking for them? Tracking them? His family had never been what you would call religious; and their parents had never taken them to church on Sunday. But he figured he would dot his i’s and cross his t’s and pray anyway. He closed his eyes, “Please God, let Jess and Erin have made it out of there.” Considering what they had escaped from, they needed divine intercession just to survive and not be re-captured. He kept his eyes closed and thought about all of them – him, Allen, Jess, Erin – all of them making it back home. How wonderful that would be. The daydream pulled him in and he succumbed to sleep.

  It was the dog that woke him. It sniffed him cautiously, wagging its tail slowly. The sun was slipping down behind another bank of clouds and he could hear rumbling in the distance. More rain on its way. Chris figured that was good, it would keep the signs of his passing to a minimum. The dog sniffing him was a mutt, but she had a collar so, Oh no, this old mutt was definitely a male. Chris wondered if he belonged to the occupants of the nearby house. He hadn’t barked or given away his position, a fact for which Chris was profoundly grateful.

  A moment later someone called out, far away, too far to hear a name, and the dog bounded away. Chris lay there, unmoving, certain it would lead its master back to his hiding place at any moment. The minutes ticked by and no one came and darkness fell early as the cloud cover moved in and the thunder rumbled louder.